


it should have been us

by argle_fraster



Category: Final Fantasy X & Final Fantasy X-2
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-19
Updated: 2011-10-19
Packaged: 2017-10-24 19:08:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,027
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/266864
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/argle_fraster/pseuds/argle_fraster
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was always assumed that they would be together.</p>
            </blockquote>





	it should have been us

It was always assumed that they would be together– she was the princess of engine grease and motor oil, with smudges on the bridge of her nose, and he was the only boy her father tolerated enough to be around. And they'd run through the gear shifts and laugh, and Cid would rustle Gippal's hair and give his daughter a knowing look that always seemed to imply _be good, you hear? be good for this_ and Gippal thought that maybe that was just how it worked.

So he told her that they were supposed to be together, and she'd laughed and laughed and _gross, who says I want to marry you?_ and she'd streaked off with her hair a golden banner behind her and her tongue halfway out of her mouth, but she'd smiled anyway, and he thought he wouldn't really mind being with her.

\-------

On the day her mother died, she'd worn a yellow sundress and carried a bouquet of deep red flowers, _oh, mama loved these, she saw them at auntie's wedding,_ and they'd danced on the dunes and flung sand in the air. That's what they did, that's who they were, because they were children of the hot summer heat and they were used to the hatred from the rest of Spira. Sometimes, he didn't think they were even children anymore, not them, but it was okay, and it wasn't too sad, and Rikku only cried a little bit when she scattered the red petals into the sea of sand.

\-------

He'd wanted to join the Crusaders but they told him he was ineligible, so he'd lied about his age and joined the other group, the secret one; the Crimson Squad. And she'd waited outside the airship that he took to get there, making mean faces at him, and he wasn't sure if she was upset that he was leaving. He said well, when I come back, you can be mad at me then and she'd stuck her tongue out, like usual, and _well, I will, you watch me, you wait til you get back!_ and then they'd laughed, and he'd left.

And she'd waved til he couldn't see her figure anymore, and he thought it was okay. He thought that was how it worked.

\-------

Nothing was what he thought once he was in the Squad– nothing and everything, all at once, and they ran and fought and fought and ran and nothing changed and everything changed. Cid used to tell him, when he was younger, _there's a moment, you hear? There's a moment when you know, you just know what to do, you know what you're supposed to be doing,_ and Gippal was pretty sure he'd been talking about airship piloting, but it worked for the rest of life, too.

And his moment– well, the moment part was dead on. Paine would say later it had been three seconds, three seconds between the two shots, and those three seconds lasted longer than anything else he'd ever experienced; longer than when the Zu had sunk its claws into his eye, longer than when Rikku was lying motionless with the aftermath of the thunder spell flickering on her skin. And the three seconds slowed everything, so the world around him was a blur, and the shot was echoing in his head. He only got three seconds to turn and open his mouth and stare and stare and _no, no,_ and then the second shot rang out.

It was just so odd, that of all the moments when he'd finally figured everything out, it was the one that wouldn't last. He had three seconds to understand before his world turned into shades of red and black. It was just unfair that they'd made it out of the cave, and out of the set-up, and to the Highroad where everything had seemed rattled and shaken but still okay, still running, still working.

Everything was red like the petals of Rikku's flowers.

\--------

He must have been out for a long time; by the time he woke, he was back on Bikanel, and Home was gone, and Rikku was there looking older and worn, like paper stretched too thin. _Don't you know?_ she said. _I was a Guardian, a Guardian for Yunie. Don't you know, we saved her!_ And he wanted to tell her that of course he didn't know, he'd been unconscious, he'd been shot, but there were red rims on her eyes, so he didn't say anything at all.

He wasn't stupid, and he wasn't blind, and he found her later that night in her room, crying into her pillow, and so he moved up to the bed with her and she'd thrown her arms around him, _Gippal, Gippal, Gippal._ And he wondered why she was so sad when Yuna had lived, she'd lived and saved them all, and Rikku had helped to save her.

It took him awhile to realize that while Yuna hadn't died, someone else might have.

\--------

 _I hate Yevon,_ she said, _I hate it, I hate it,_ and she was curled up next to the window in a miserable ball, looking out at the moon hanging over the desert. He did, too– hated Yevon with everything he had in him. Yevon was horrible and terrible and hanging between them like a stifling curtain. Yevon was their guarded eyes and their tired steps and the hearts that had been granted only to be ripped back out again. They ran so far away from it only to run in a full circle back into it again.

But Yevon had given them something, hadn't it? It'd given them both something and then snatched it away again, and how ironic it was that they were sitting there, the same, the same nightmares and bloodstains and pyreflies.

Rikku just sniffed, _it should have been us, huh? It would have been easy, oh, it should have been us all along,_ and he closed his eyes, _it never was us anyway._

They fell asleep that way, sitting against the window and staring up at the moon, and when he woke the next morning he had a horrible crick in his neck.


End file.
